The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1887-02-15
NEW YORK SHOP GIRLS
A Glimpse at their Everyday
Lives.
CRANKINESs OF CUSTOMERS.
How the Girls Live and The. Wages
They Receive-Fifty Thousand
Strong.

Correspondents VI IhO AASi UtW' 1hCI
say that Mrs. LAMA, the pet author of
the fashionable world just now, dreams
the plots OF her best novels. II persis-
tent dreaming were a requisite o.
moaern authorship, how the ranks Of
the guild might be recruited from the
shop-girl population.
The dreaming is worse than the
work" said a dispenser OF handker-
chiefs, laces and embroideries 10 me in
'momentary lull of the afternoon rit t
in one of New York's biggest dry goods
stores the other day. "All night long 1
live the day over again. Hands fly
before my face this way and that, point
ing to one thing, reaching for another.
Women crowd be ore the counter ten
deep; they storm it so violently that
the front RANKS are lifted right on top OF
the show cases, and there they mouth
and gibber and gesticulate at me till |
wake with a start in fear of an ava
lanche of angry women. In my dreams
the cash girls are all stupid, the bundles
C JmcN united, the change is always
wrong, returned parcels are flung in my
lace until look TO the morning 10 rest
me from the labors of the night.p
From where l sat on the wEjrling
stool in front of this Gamsel , + the black
apron and dangling scissors, | looked
about on the endless panorama that
J had been passing before her eyes ali
{ day. The bonneted crowds pusued and
! jostled, they surged this way and
counter currents set that way; there
was din of multitude of voices lifted
in lnterminable questions; the air was
alternately hot with the breath of this
struggling mass of humanity and chilled
as January blast rushed in from an
| opened door. Then | looked at my
! dreamer. Her arms were tired with
reaching down boxes and putting them
| back again. IL had been SO IN the
morning, it was SO at noon, 1t would be
so at II ght. She was asking herself
or was asking myself for her-Where
the myriads Of people came from, what
they all wanted, why they couldn't get
it quickly and gO-.away. Never mind,
the great public must be served even ii
backs broke.
Multiply the dreamer by $4,000, OF
thereab0uts, and you have the shop
girls of New York. They are young
and they are old; they are pretty and
hollOw-eyed, and their hair is streaked
with gray. They live at home with
their mothers; they gather their house
hold treasures about them in little 6 8
hall bedrooms in dreary boarding
! houses, and they. keep house with
! families of big folks and little folks
| dependent on them. They are city
| born, they land at Castle Garden and
they flock in from the country, eager in
the first flush of young womanhood to
earn an IN dependent living. They are
| light-headed and talk Of the theatre and
their best young man on the horse cars
| they are studIous and read Schiller and
Helne in the original in the same
| vehicles. have seen them try on bon
nets above their own fluffy curls in the
| morning before the days grind began,
until 1t seemed their apologies for brains
must DE chaos inde> crlbable of ribbons
and laces and VelvetS and feathers, and
stylish shapes and sweet" effects {;
aud l have seen them handing about an
autograph letter from Bartholdi, in
which the French sculptor thanked
them for choosing his name to grace
their study club.
The CLOAK room of one Of New York $
Int: minable dry goods houses is, in
itself, a revelation of the beWildering
growth OF the shop-gi population. One
house, possibly the largest, employs Il
force Of 2 500 employees, and of these
| two-th rds are women; LOGO hats and
bonnetS, grave and gay, 1000 cioaks and
shawls, hang in endless rows aboubits
roblng rooms, and the comings and the
! gGlngs, the doffings and the dOnnings Of
those hats and those CloakS are watched
| by the sharp eyes OF the "timekeeper,"
who sits all day perched at his de>k just
within the door. The Wearers of that
armory of hats in in squads in the
morning; they file out few at time
as they can be spared for lunch at noon.
and they flock out to be at liberty at
! night. Their tempe are worn to sucn
a thin edge by keeping a stock of smiles
on hand for all humanity that they
grow irritable among themselves on
small proVucatlOn some times, and Wran-
gle about whose turn it is to come early
next morning to shake out the gowns
and brush the cloaks and wind the rib
bons and put away the gloves, and var
lously take care of the multitudlnouS
apparel OF New York femininity ;or who
can eat at 2 and VINO must stay their
8 arved stomach till 8. When Margaret
Fuller gave up school teaching she said
she was tired of making up her face to
suit other people; she wanted her per
sonality to herself. The 90 600 shop
girls, from o'clock in the morning till
from 6 to 10 at night, own neither their
faces nor their tastes nor their opinions
and tits SIN all wonder their individuality
will assert itself now and then in little
petty spite.
What does she get for it? There is
small opportunity for the saleswoman
to pile up fortune. Her wages vary
according TO age, experience, good looks
sometimes, the disposition Of the house
she serves always. Under the most
favorable circumstances, in those
establishments-for such exist-Which
take sympathetic interest in the wei
fare OF their emp Dyes, young girl of
1Smay earn from So to 81 per week dur
Ing the first year or two of her service.
Sometimes she earns more. The figure
may be as high as Sc or IS; but on the
other hand, they may be lower. Some
times she doe not get above 81. If she
shows capacity for her work there is
| chance OF promotion; $40 per week for
young woman who has reached % or
70 IS not SO rare as it might be and SIS